“Enormity of War Crimes”

Gunshots echoed
Smoke knocked down the air, overcast day.
A blood-shed bed dispersed
over miles and miles until it all sounded anomaly.
A city bathed in red,
Blood dripping pieces of flesh strewed,
drenched in cold.
Defeat mounted inchmeal;
arrived in the doorstep of the country, turning into turmoil.
Escape to nowhither,
not from their dear homes, whilst
countless civilians are slaughtered ceaselessly by professed ruthless saints.
Callous inhumanity shattered in every corner of the country
dreaded in terror, uncalled tragedy
leaving into helplessness, vulnerability.
And they would flee, hands cleaned.
Who would measure the analogy between corrupt civilization
to the illusive metaphors of enormity in these War Crimes?
Reconciling often leaves imbrued in a slew of misdemeanors.
Never forgiven, never forgotten.
Thus surviving the vale of tears, impassive and aloof
withstanding from the bitterness plagued amongst them already, is hard.
Burning anger, hunger for reprisal would weaken their innocent hearts
despite they’d respire in the city of envenom rivals painted their streets red.
Enormity of war crimes digging to reach abyss, rotted in hell, crumbled into dust.

~an impromptu poem for #NaPoWriMo day 24

Prompt Day 24: Hard-boiled detective novels are known for their use of vivid similes, often with an ironic or sarcastic tone. Novelist Raymond Chandler is particularly adept at these. Here are a few from his novels:

• A few locks of dry, white hair clung to his scalp, like wild flowers fighting for life on a bare rock.
• Dead men are heavier than broken hearts.
• From 30 feet away she looked like a lot of class. From 10 feet away she looked like something made up to be seen from 30 feet away.
• She smelled the way the Taj Mahal looks by moonlight.
• He looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food.

Today, I’d like to challenge you to channel your inner gumshoe, and write a poem in which you describe something with a hard-boiled simile. Feel free to use just one, or try to go for broke and stuff your poem with similes till it’s . . . as dense as bread baked by a plumber, as round as the eyes of a girl who wants you to think she’s never heard such language, and as easy to miss as a brass band in a cathedral. https://www.napowrimo.net/day-twenty-four-8/

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